


The Ending Season

by Iju



Category: The Ending Season Celebration
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-15
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-10-28 18:41:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17792681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iju/pseuds/Iju
Summary: Penelope Rawlings Drummont and Colin McGellish live in the 16th century. She is married to a ruler named Sir Roger who is in actuality in love with his Right Hand, Percival. She is basically kept as a prisoner in the manor and sees a chance of escape in Colin McGellish who comes to the manor during the Ending Season Celebration. She leaves with him to go find her father in France; many adventures and tentative love ensues as they roam the English countrysides and Scotland Highland and moors.





	The Ending Season

**Author's Note:**

> If you're wondering why this stuff is different from my other stuff, it's because it's my mom's ongoing story. She didn't want to get an account for herself yet, she just wanted to see if anyone would want to read her stuff, you know, see if it's any good. She's inspired by Diana Gabaldon's work and wanted to try her hand at a winding story of her own. She would appreciate feedback. Thanks!
> 
> This isn't the beginning of the story. This chapter takes place somewhere in the middle; Colin and his trusted friend Leargas are in the middle of rescuing Penelope from a very serious crisis. It hasn't been heavily edited yet.

After Colin had forced the guard to loose her bonds with the gun pointed to his head, Leargas struck him with the brunt of his dirk and he fell to the ground. Colin went to put her arm over his shoulder so he could help her get over to the window to go down the rope, but he was very leary she would be able to do this. He was scared at how weak she looked; she was pale, thin and her skin felt clammy; she could sense what his reluctance was about. 

“I can do it. I just need to do something first.” Leargas had taken his knife out earlier thinking he’d need it, just in case, but when it was obvious he wouldn’t, he went to slip it back into his waistband when Penelope held out a shaking hand for his dirk. At first, he didn’t know what she wanted, but after a quick glance down at his hand, and a short nod from her, he offered it to her.

She turned to her reluctant liberator with grim resolution. Colin was anxious to get out of that room and moved to take the dirk from her. “We don’t have time-”

She made a guttural sound and snatched away from him; her eyes ablaze with rage and determination. The guard looked at her and she relished the fear she saw in his eyes; the panic at not knowing what a raised dirk was going to mean for him. She turned to Leargas while Colin watched the scene play out.

“If you don’t mind, Mr. Leargas, would you kindly place your hand over his mouth.” Her voice trembling from hunger and exposure in a cold cell. 

Leargas complied and the rest happened without words. She slid over, yanked his breeches all the way down to his ankles and straddled him. Colin opened his mouth to say something but knew in that instant that what was happening needed to happen. Penelope needed to do what he now knew in that moment what she was going to do and he was silent. 

Her breathing came in short bursts through her nose then turned into deep throated grunts. The guard yelled into Leargas' hand and struggled against him but it was no use; he was going nowhere. She raised the dirk over him as he screamed into Leargus’ hand; it was raised over his chest and then in what seemed like a last minute decision, she brought it lower and, made a clean even swipe; blood squirted everywhere; Penelope picked up her bloody quarry.

“Mr. Leargas, if you don’t mind, can you remove your hand now?”

It was a swift movement: Leargus’ hand moved away and she shoved the appendage down his throat while he choked on it. She shoved deeper and deeper making unearthly sounds. She used all her weight to push down until he stopped struggling and lay motionless. 

Colin walked over to her and softly spoke. “We have to go, lass, if we expect to get away.” He lifted her up and threw her arm over his shoulder. She turned and nodded grabbing onto his shoulder letting his weight carry her. He knew she would be in considerable pain sliding her way down the rope, but the only satisfaction he had was it was not a far way down. He went first so he’d be on the ground to gather her when she reached him. Leargas was the last to come down. Colin sat Penelope lengthwise across him with her eyes closed; her head cradled in his arms while he held onto the reins with one hand.

She whispered something and he asked her to repeat it. “Aye, lass?”

“Take me away from here. “ She said it quietly at first but then started to shout it. 

“Take me away from here! Take me away here!” 

Her body shook violently; the pain tearing itself through her body as the tears that rolled down her face were pathetically inadequate. Colin gripped her tighter so as to keep her from falling, and it was then he saw the blood trickling down the side of the horse’s stomach coming from underneath Penelope. The shaking stopped. 

 

 

He burst through the door holding a silent, still Penelope.

“Fizzis! Fizzis!” His voice crazed with panic.

A stout full bodied woman came rushing from the back of the house wiping her hands on her apron. “What’s all the fuss? My goodness you’d think-” Her voice caught in her throat at the sight of Colin, and what seemed to her, holding a dead body, and looking terror stricken.

“Lay her here, lad.” She pointed to a table to her right.

Colin placed her down and immediately started asking for a diagnosis. 

“I don’t know yet, lad. Ye just laid her down. I need to check her breathing.” She bent down putting her ear to her chest. 

“Is she-” His voice near screaming.

“Be still! I need to hear!” She put her ear closer to her chest.

Colin swallowing down his helplessness while he watched her impatiently.

“She’s breathing, lad, but just barely.” She jerked her hand to a low shelf over her window. “Fetch me ma basket.”

Colin grabbed it and shoved it next to her. He didn’t understand what she was doing, but she moved adroitly at her work. She took a grayish powder and slipped some of it in the pocket of one side of her mouth then put a white powder in the other side. There was also a small glass bottle that had a brown liquid in it. When she took off the top, it filled the whole room with a cloying herbal scent. She carefully lifted Penelope’s head and dribbled a small bit into her mouth gently rubbing her throat encouraging her to swallow it down. She made a sound so low that Fizzis could hear it, but Colin couldn’t. 

“Go out to the well and fill that bucket by the door and bring it to me then fill the other, and pour it in the kettle over the hearth.” 

Colin’s fear made him move like fire licking through brush. He was back in no time with the first water and then set to getting the other water on the hearth. She took one of her knives and carefully cut the filthy, bloody dress off of her and draped a blanket she grabbed off the nearby chair to afford her some modesty. Then Fizzis dipped a towel in the cool water and set to rubbing Penelope down. 

“I need to get the fever down. She’s burning to death!”

Colin, the normally confident, dominant man was struck to his core with fear. He stood stupefied watching Fizzis go about her ministrations feeling like he was wrapped in coils by helplessness. The cold snaking sensation going up and down his spine made him shiver. He didn’t hear Fizzis call to him.

“Colin!”

“Aye!” 

“Dinna ye hear me call ye? Never mind. Come rub her down while I tend to the water in the hearth.”

Colin came over taking the towel from Fizzis. “Besides, ye look like ye need something to do besides lookin like ye’re lookin at a ghost.” She patted him on the shoulder. “She’s strong. I can tell. Her heart’s beatin slow but strong. This first night will tell.”

“Aye, she strong alright. Ye’ve not seen her in a fight.” Despite his stricken condition he smiled. “I donna want to think too much about what the lass...what she’s had to…” His voice trailed off.

“Don’t think about it, lad. All ye need to think about right now is tendin to her fever.” She walked over to the hearth and placed some herbs in the kettle over it and stirred it slowly for a awhile.

Colin gently rubbed the damp towel over her body noticing the bruises and fresh scars. His stomach lurched and hot tears stung his eyes. She needed him to do this for her; she didn’t need him to fall apart. If sponging her off was all he could do to let her know he was there, then that’s what he would do. He would try to squash down his terror for her, Lord knows it was nothing compared to the story her body was telling him she’d been through. 

His running dialogue to himself was working until...he reached the tops of her thighs. The brutality to the lower end of her body made him gasp and recoil; he dropped the towel. Fizzis swirled around and came to pick it up.

“Can’t use that anymore.” She went to fetch another and upon returning saw why he was frozen. She gently touched his arm. “Listen, lad, Colin, I think maybe ye should wait outside while I handle this part. If I need ye, I’ll let ye know.”

Colin gathered enough of his mind from off the floor to answer her. “No, she needs me, Fizzis, it doesna matter if she doesna know I’m here. I won’t abandon her. I want to stay.” He whispered the words even though yelling them wouldn’t have roused her. 

“Well then,” Fizzis looked over at the hearth. “Go stir the pot. I can’t be two places a’ once and I’m gonna need that in a while.” She knew Colin wouldn’t leave but she also knew he shouldn’t be standing right there for what she had to do. 

“Aye, I’ll go and do that.” He spoke haltingly. 

He stirred the pot and tried to put all his thoughts on what was going on in that kettle and not on the weary business behind him. He heard Fizzis gasp and mumble something in Gaelic. He gripped the wooden spoon harder and breathed faster. Penelope made low weak moans as Fizzis worked. She must’ve dropped some lavender in the water she was using because Colin could smell its unmistakable aroma. She spoke softly to her in a strange tongue that he didn’t know. She crooned it to her like she was talking to a child. 

Colin thought to himself that his contribution would be to make sure the what was in that kettle would serve her well because he was doing his part by stirring it. He tried to channel all his love and devotion into the act of stirring. He was doing it for her. When he could hear Penelope’s tiny noises of discomfort, he would spin the spoon around in the water faster. He took a hesitant glance over his shoulder and noticed the pile of bloody towels growing beside Fizzis’ feet. She looked up at him with a gentle reproof in her eyes to turn back around. 

He could see her face in his mind reflected in the water from the last time they spoke; all smiles and gritty determination. He didn’t think he’d ever seen a more beautiful or braver woman. Now, all he felt was self-recrimination. He should’ve insisted she stay behind. The water started to really boil and Colin made sure the herbs didn’t stick to the sides. He made wide motions with his arms so Penelope would have a potent medicine when it was ready. His arms ached; he didn’t care. His back ached with the strain and he bent lower so it would purposefully hurt more. 

He heard Fizzis go to the back of the house for a few minutes then return. She came back with fresh linens to wrap Penelope’s lower half and to ensure that any returning blood would be taken care of. The room smelled of lavender, herbs and the coppery scent of blood. 

She came to take over the stirring but Colin yanked the spoon away and kept on sloshing the water around the pot not looking up at her. He wasn’t thinking about his movements; they were automatic. He just stood there stirring that damn kettle letting his tears mingle in as a healing offering. Fizzis left him to his penance. 

 

 

***

Several hours later with Penelope settled in the spare bedroom in the back and the mixture in the kettle cooling off, Fizzis and Colin sat outside on a couple of old stumps smoothed down years ago by Fizzis’ husband when he was alive.

Fizzis was the only woman Colin knew who smoked a pipe; the smooth cedar and cinnamon bark smell floating around his head helped to clear it a little. She and Gully, her old man, as she used to call him, would sit outside and smoke their pipes together. Gully used to say he figured any woman who could smoke a pipe must be the kind that don’t put on airs and if there was anything he couldn’t stand was a fancy that put on airs; so he married her. There was also the facts that she could cook, shoot a pistol, make ale and heal just about anything. Anything except the stroke that took him.

She handed it to Colin who took a deep long inhale. “I mixed in some Butter Dream bark...to help a bit with sleeping tonight.” 

“Thank ye, but I dinna know how much sleep I’ll be gettin tonight.”

It was quiet for a long time between them; they just passed the pipe back and forth until Colin finally spoke again. “I’m goin to be leavin on the morrow. I should be gone for awhile. I’ll leave ye some coin to take care of things while I’m gone. I’d like to leave her here. I donna want to have to worrit about her. I need...I need to know without a doubt she’s safe.”

 

Fizzis took a long drag. “I’ll watch out for yere woman for ye, Colin, ye know I will. You donna have to ask. Ye’re like my own lad.”

“Thank ye, Fizzis. I donna know what I’d be doin right now without ye.”

She looked up at the display of falling stars streaking across the sky. “Ye can do me a favor.”

“Anything.” He said.

“I don’t rightly want to know what ye’re plannin’ to do, but if ye’re plannin’ what any other man would be plannin after ‘findin’ his woman in the state ye found yours, then make sure of one thing,” She turned to look him in the eyes. “Make sure ye take a blade, twist it in his guts and twist it around.” She took another drag before handing it back to Colin. “Will ye do that?” 

Colin put the pipe to his mouth. “I will. And more.” They sat in silence for the rest of their time outside.


End file.
